Prostasia Foundation
Prostasia Foundation is an American non-profit organization founded in San Fransisco, August 15, 2018.[1] The foundation's activities include, but are not limited to the provision of public and private forum facilities for minor attracted people, the provision of child abuse prevention training and consultancy services to corporate and other clients, and grants for researchers. Prostasia Foundation has also been seen to carry out awareness-raising activities in the form of numerous public media and social media engagement campaigns.
Since its inception, Prostasia has attracted a lot of attention throughout social media due to its sometimes bizarrely angled anti-CSA messaging. The idea that Prostasia may be in some way designed to stimulate adverse publicity (a so-called "psy-op") has been raised numerous times. These concerns usually focus on the following topics:
- The choice of Noah Berlatsky as Communications Spokesman - A Social Justice Warrior, Anti-Gamergater and Jewish journalist, who is likely to trigger visceral reactions among the alternative-right.
- His and others general reactions in video productions, described as "fake empathy" and "hand wringing".
- General confusion in their messaging as to whether minors are separated from adults in their online chats.
- Publicity concerning campaigns in favor of sex doll use among MAPs.
- Bizarre, "sex positive" messaging, somehow incorporating kink, BDSM and Sex Worker rights into their anti-abuse platform.
- The name "Prostasia" (protection), and its subliminal evocation of prostatic hyperplasia (Prostate Enlargement).
- The choice of an elephant as a mascot, and various branded online merchandise.
- Various rules of engagement for online fora - effectively demanding complete abstinence from even hypothetical dissent against the CSA narrative of universal harm.
Prostasia receives funding through crowd finance, memberships and anonymous donations (Bitcoin and Monero are options according to their website). They have also supposedly received money from an institutional investor.[2] Ultimately, with anonymous donation a possibility, there is no way of telling who their critical benefactors are, at this point.
Commentary
Within the usual protocols (use Tor, VPNs, Pseudonyms), we see nothing dangerous about joining this organization - if their sanitized level of discussion is your kind of thing. They also host a useful library of research on a range of topics relevant to MAP activism. When assessing the type of organization we have before us, the term "big grift" would certainly be one of the most apt. We must ask ourselves, considering the unusual collection of journalists, academics and educators involved in Prostasia, would either it, or its platform have arisen "organically", without the critical impetus of a big whale donor? The answer to that is probably "no". It is highly likely that the publicity surrounding Prostasia is the primary reason for its existence and continued funding. On the positive side, this will have the effect of bringing MAPs into the limelight - something we will likely benefit from, and should seek to take advantage of through our own media campaigns.